The cover of Chef John Currence’s new cookbook says it all. No styled plate of food, or charming portrait of the chef himself cooking. Instead, the image is that of a seasoned cast-iron pan on a worn, wooden table.

“I look at these other guys who are capable of creating these highly creative, fussy, detailed presentations, and mine I just feel is hideous if compared,” says Currence, speaking by phone from his home in Oxford, Miss.

The head of City Grocery Restaurant Group has the same “take-me-as-I-am” style in cooking as in life. And Currence’s new cookbook, “Pickles, Pigs & Whiskey: Recipes From My Three Favorite Food Groups And Then Some,” reflects that quality. Whether it’s jambalaya boudin or Szechuan catfish, Currence has an approach all his own.

“Lots of chefs who write books declare that their cuisine is very personal,” writes John T. Edge in the foreword. “Half the time, I don’t buy the rhetoric. This time I do. John Currence has written a book ... with recipes that conjure his past and his present and pay homage to the place he calls home.”

Currence will share his approach to food with Greenville at a special dinner at Bacon Bros. Public House Monday. Executive chef Anthony Gray will create a menu inspired by the cookbook, and general manager and beverage director Jason Callaway will create cocktails. “Chef Currence is an inspiration to Southern cooks and home cooks alike,” Gray says. “He has a knack for taking traditional-style ingredients and putting a new spin on them.”

Currence, who grew up in New Orleans and the Carolinas, is an advocate of Southern food, though he does not label himself a Southern chef. How would you define such, he asks. “Is it the guys fussing up soul food cooking? Are you doing Creole Italian? Or are you interpreting the German immigrants in the South?”

Now, he’s comfortable enough with himself to find his own path.

Currence became immersed in restaurants while a student at UNC working at Bill Neal’s Crook’s Corner. He worked his way up, eventually returning to New Orleans to help open Geautreau’s. He moved to Oxford in 1992 and opened City Grocery there.

Since then, Currence has opened four other restaurants. He’s not done, he says, because there is more to learn.

“I’m still a firm believer that I still have a lot to learn, and that excites me. The day that you quit, or the day you think you’ve reached the end of the Internet, is the day I hope I die. I’m profoundly entertained by these guys who think their bucket of knowledge is all that exists.”